History shows if Michigan State can beat UCLA, Tom Izzo will get Spartans to Sweet 16

AP PhotoMichigan State's Tom Izzo lives for the quick turnarounds and preparations required to excel in the NCAA tournament.

EAST LANSING -- Michigan State might find, after a season of unmet expectations, that flipping the switch in the NCAA tournament rarely works.

Unless you’re Michigan State.

That’s the conundrum in dismissing the 19-14 Spartans as 10th-seed cannon fodder. The only Spartans who haven’t played in a Final Four are first-year players. And Tom Izzo, who annually gauges his own mental rewiring by sunnier days and bird chirps, is the master of the two-day turnaround, if MSU can get past Thursday’s 9:20 p.m. opener against UCLA in Tampa.

"Like coach always says, if we win that first game, he’s going to win the second one for you," Delvon Roe said. "Just get through that first game."

Izzo is 16-3 when coaching the second game of an NCAA tournament weekend, with losses in the 2009 national championship game to a superior North Carolina team, a 2007 second-round loss to North Carolina at Winston-Salem, N.C., and a 2003 regional final loss to Texas at San Antonio.

The Spartans and UCLA have combined to appear in the past six Final Fours, although the senior-less Bruins’ last one was in 2008, when their oldest players were in high school.

The Spartans have been in the last two. And they expressed surprising confidence that they could reach a third consecutive after drawing a young opening opponent, then a potential Saturday matchup against No. 2 Florida, whose 77-74 win last year against MSU was aided by the Spartans’ season-worst 23 turnovers.

Draymond Green said when the Spartans talk about benefiting from NCAA tournament experience -- their seniors are 11-3 in tournament games, the most wins of any active class in college basketball -- it isn’t just the games, but also time management, the regimented open-practice and media schedules, the beyond-prying-eyes practices, and the copious hours of study.

"It can mentally drain you," Green said. "I think the experience of it all really helps.

"It’s definitely more than just going out and playing the game, because everything leading up to the game is really what makes the game. It’s the film sessions, the practices, the walk-throughs, how you approach things, how you carry yourself, all those different things that go into it, that you have to show the freshmen, because there’s no joking around. There’s none of that stuff that you may do in the regular season. It’s a whole different approach."

Green, after Sunday night’s selection show, said he would begin his video study of UCLA later that night.

"There is no tomorrow, so if you wait until tomorrow, there won’t be one," he said.

The constant in the Spartans’ NCAA tournament consistency is Izzo, who has presided over the school’s 14-year streak of tournament appearances, including a national championship and six Final Fours in the past 12 years.

"There’s nothing better than March, there really isn’t," he said. "And there’s nothing better than having to work when you know, probably, (it means) two or three points in a tournament game. It might be an inbounds play, it might be a free-throw cut out, it might be some of those things that you can control.

"Unfortunately, it might be a missed free throw, or a couple of shots like (Penn State’s Talor) Battle hit (in MSU’s Big Ten tournament loss), that you can’t control. So what you try to do is control the things that you can control and see where it takes you."

Kalin Lucas said he is consistently surprised at how prepared the coaches are in the second game of an NCAA weekend, in particular citing the Spartans’ 2009 upset of No. 1-ranked Louisville in a regional final.

"My sophomore year, we went from playing Kansas, then went right back and played Louisville, and they had everything down pat, that they were going to press, they were going to do this, do that. We just knew everything," Lucas said. "During this time of year, the coaches don’t sleep. We sleep, but the coaches and the coaching staff, they scout, and they watch a lot of film, and they just try to have us prepared to win."

Roe said the Spartans have developed a day-to-day mindset that serves them well in tournament play.

"Winning a game against UCLA doesn’t mean that you’ve won the tournament," he said. "OK, you won, now move on, who’ve you got next? You have to move on with a quick mind and get ready for that next game. There’s no being happy about a win for a couple of days when you have to get ready for another game in an hour."﻿